


Merman Boyfriend

by rose_gardens



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, Implied Romance, M/M, Merperson Eren Yeager
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:40:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27433675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rose_gardens/pseuds/rose_gardens
Summary: For the first time ever, there's a new exhibit at the Shiganshina Aquarium, and people are coming in from all around the country to see. Local Armin Arlert comes to see what the fuss is about.Written for Fall Eremin Week 2020 Day 5: Mermaid Aquarium AU
Relationships: Armin Arlert/Eren Yeager
Comments: 3
Kudos: 47





	Merman Boyfriend

**Author's Note:**

> super duper late entry for eremin week! I didn't finish it in time but I had a good story and wanted to share it anyway. the romance here is implied.

The Shiganshina Aquarium didn't see a lot of traffic. It was a second-rate tourist attraction opened by the local marine researchers to make up for the funding they didn't get. Armin Arlert had spent almost every day there last summer, with little else to do. The teenager owned the aquarium's only season pass.

Armin's university was far away, so he had to stay on campus during semesters. When he came back for spring break, he discovered the town packed like a Disneyland carpark. There was barely enough room for him to drive down the town's wide streets.

He asked his grandfather about the traffic after dinner.

"Oh, there's a new exhibit at the aquarium," he explained, washing up the plates.

"New exhibit?" Armin questioned, drying the plate his grandfather passed him. There were never new exhibits.

"Yes," his grandfather said. "They caught some rare fish. At least, that's what Mary at the chip shop said. One of the tourists told her son."

 _"Sure,"_ Armin said, disbelieving. Mary from the chip shop was an unreliable gossip. You had to take everything she said with a grain of salt. "What kind of fish would bring in all these people, though?"

"Ah, I've no idea," his grandfather said. "I'd say it's something nobody's seen before, though. An extinct thing, like a Nessie or something."

Or, as Armin would find out later, a mermaid.

It was plastered all over the aquarium - posters advertising their new attraction. _Never before seen! A scientific discovery! A_ _half-fish_ _,_ _half-man_ _!_ Below was a cartoon drawing of a smiling fish-tailed blonde lady.

It reminded Armin of those old circus advertisements, where they'd put a dead monkey in a fish's mouth and pass it off as a mermaid. It was absolutely 100% a scam.

Though the many cars in the aquarium carpark seemed to say otherwise.

For the first time ever, Armin was stuck at the end of a long line. People chatted excitedly in front of him, restraining small children and checking their phones.

It took an hour for him to even reach the inside of the aquarium. There was a new person at the front desk, a girl he thought went to the local highschool. She busily sold checked tickets, letting in tourists to the main room in groups of six.

"Hey, I have a pass," Armin said when he reached the front desk. He passed over the slip of paper he kept in the wallet, and the girl checked it.

"All good. Wait over there, and you'll be let in in ten," she said, going to check the next tourist's ticket. Armin went to where she pointed, to a marked 'waiting zone' with a group of other excited visitors. A tired looking guy not much older than Armin stood with two excited tweens, looking over a brochure. A couple held each other's hands and giggled to each other, the taller of the two pointing to a poster displaying different types of local sea life and deliberately mispronouncing the names.

Armin didn't talk to any of the tourists. He waited in painful silence, each second taking longer than the last. He was sure that the so-called "mermaid" was simply a hoax to generate revenue, but there was a glimmer of doubt - what if there _was_ a mermaid?

No. He was being foolish. Mermaids were just the stuff of fairytales.

When the ten excruciating minutes had finally passed, the aquarium door opened. A group exited, abuzz with excitement. 

"And right this way, if you will," a young man in the aquarium's polo shirt said. Armin didn't know him either. He must have been hired to deal with the new influx of visitors. He lead the group through the door, into the first room. Tanks were built into the walls, displaying the local sealife. The guide gave a speech about rules against flash photography and tapping the glass, before launching into an explanation of the different things the aquarium did. Conservation programs, marine life rescue and rehab, school visits. It was all stuff Armin knew about, so he blocked it out. He was here for one thing only. 

It seemed that the other guests were here for that same reason. The only people who looked interested were one of the tweens and a middle aged woman. The couple were looking at a sea urchin in a tank, the other tween was pulling on her guardian's hand - and he just looked exhausted. Impatient, Armin started rocking back and forth on his feet. 

"And in the next room, you'll see our crustaceans," the guide said, leading the party into the next room. Plastic crabs adorned the walls, smiling with zoologically inaccurate mouths. Crabs and lobsters and crayfish sat in tanks and moved about lazily. The guide gave them all an introduction. Armin knew all their names - hell, he'd helped name some of them. Again, this was not new to him. Time passed ever so slowly, each second longer than the last. 

"I'll let you look around before we go into the next room, alright?" The guide said. He was met with silence. The guests clearly didn't care about the crustaceans. "Well, okay then. The next room is home to our new attraction - what I'm sure you all came here for."

Armin tensed up. Finally - he was going to see whatever the hell the aquarium was passing off as a mermaid. The tour guide led them through another door, every guest buzzing with excitement. The tween girl whispered loudly to her friend, the couple held each other's hands. 

"So, I'll need you all to be quiet in this next room," the guide told them. "He's spooked easily, and we don't want to freak him out."

The group went silent as they entered the next room. It had a large tank on the far wall, with plenty of rocks and foliage. It had once been home to an octopus named Mystique, but he had been rehabilitated last year and the tank left vacant. 

At first, Armin thought the tank was still empty. But something moved quickly, and Armin caught a flash of dark hair and fingers. 

"He's a bit shy right now," the guide said. He walked over to the tank, the group following him, and leaned in close to the glass. "Come on, say hello to the guests."

Slowly, a webbed hand crept around a rock. Then a head appeared, and a body, and a tail. 

And it looked so real.

The merman was nothing like the clip art drawing on the poster outside. He had long hair that flowed around him like seagrass. His skin was a brownish-grey colour, and his tail was not bright or ornamental. He had visible gills running down his neck (but still had a nose - interesting), and his eyes - they were green, and they had a look in them, a curious look. The merman looked over each of the guests. 

"This is Eren," the guide said. "He was found caught in a fishing net with serious lacerations to his tail and arms. He was brought back here, where he'll stay until he's recovered."

Armin noticed now the thin white scars that ran across the merman - Eren's - arms and tail. Then he saw that he was being stared at by the very same merman.

Eren blinked slowly, but his eyes were still trained on him.

"Oh, he's clearly interested in you," the tour guide said to Armin. He jumped, since he'd been so distracted by Eren.

"Is he?" The other guests were paying attention to the merman tank. Eren had torn his gaze from Armin to give attention to the other guests.

"Yeah. Mind you, there's been a lot of people through here in the last week. Every face is a new one for him."

"Is it... Is it ethical to be showing him off like this?" Armin questioned. Eren waved at one of the children, who gasped and waved back. "He seems intelligent."

"Oh, I don't know," the tour guide said. "I'm just a guide."

Armin didn't know how to feel about that.

"Have a great day!" The receptionist called as the group left the aquarium. Armin walked behind the couple, who were talking about where they wanted to go for lunch, until they were all outside again. Then he dashed around to the back entrance of the aquarium. Armin go tot the _staff only_ door next to the truck unloading bay, and tried the handle. It was unlocked, to great relief. He slipped inside, closing it behind him. 

The aquarium office was small. Posters of local marine life were plastered over the walls, and every surface was cluttered with files and forms and stationary. Sitting in the office chair, currently on a phone call, was marine scientist Hanji Zoe. They saw Armin and waved at him, pointing to the phone, and mouthing _"I'm on call."_

Armin nodded and sat on an old computer monitor. 

"Yep. Yep. Next Saturday? Okay. Zella will be around to pick up the delivery."

Armin stared at the clock on the wall. It was stuck at 7:36. Armin's phone said it was 10:15.

"Right. I'll see you then." Hanji put the phone down, and spun around in their chair. "Armin! How's college?"

"Good," he said, nodding. "I wanted to talk to you, actually. About, you know, the whole merman thing."

"Ah." Hanji adjusted their glasses. "So you've seen him, then?"

Armin nodded. "He's like, a person," he said. "A mer-person! Hanji, how long has he been here?"

"Two weeks," Hanji said. Their tone was atypically serious. "We've had news reporters from all over the country call, hyped up for the biggest marine discovery of the century." 

Armin wondered how he'd somehow missed the news reports and gossip, but it _had_ been exam week, and anything that didn't have to do with western philosophy had been washed from his brain.

"Does he... talk?" Armin asked. Eren had shown signs of intelligent behaviour.

"Well-" Hanji was about to launch into a ramble. Armin was familiar with their rambling. He didn't even find it annoying the way other people did. "He can understand us, you know? Not just like he associates sounds with actions, but he can recognise English! Spoken English, though, he can't read it. He can't speak it, either; he just makes noises, and sometimes they sound like words. We suspect at the moment that he can communicate via echolocation with other merpeople - if there are other merpeople. But he's intelligent, Armin! We've found real intelligent life in our seas!"

Hanji stood up, gesturing wildly. Armin watched them with secondhand excitement. 

"I don't even know what to say," he mumbled. "It's incredible, though."

"I know!" Hanji brushed their hair back. They bounced in place, grinning widely. "If you want, come around when we go on lunch and meet him."

"Really?" Armin asked. He put a hand to his face. "Yeah! I'd love to."


End file.
